


Of Times Gone By

by Spring_Haze



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Future Fic, M/M, Parenthood, Surrogacy, Teenagers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-18
Updated: 2019-05-18
Packaged: 2020-03-07 14:09:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18874771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spring_Haze/pseuds/Spring_Haze
Summary: Dan reflects on parenthood. He and Phil share two teenage daughters, Willow Rowan and Adrienne Katherine. The girls are growing up, and Dan chooses optimism and gratitude as the Howell-Lester family faces a potential change in it's dynamic. There is nothing but love and fluff here.





	Of Times Gone By

They said that it would fly by, that the days of puppet shows, playgrounds, and picnics would be over too soon.

They were right.

All of these things have been replaced, including our names. We are no longer 'Daddy;' we are just 'Dad.' It should be confusing, but it actually works really well for us. Like everything else, we just sort of become one.

The names are probably the best things that we've ever shared, and we've shared an awful lot in twenty-seven years. It's been more thrilling and rewarding than any book or tour. And Phil agrees; becoming parents together, almost sixteen years ago, has been our most incredible adventure so far.

The girls are almost sixteen and fourteen. They are smart, funny, beautiful girls. They take after me and Phil in too many ways to count, even though each girl only shares half of our DNA. Willow was born first, and she comes from Phil. Adrienne came along almost two years later, and she comes from me. Still, there is plenty of Phil in Adrienne, and plenty of me in Willow. 

The girls share a mother, a woman we consider to be our very close family friend. We will never reveal her identity; it is a decision that the four of us made long before our journey began. She and her husband are in solid agreement. Privacy has always been our most precious asset, though it has nearly been compromised on more than one occasion. There was a time in which we considered hiding our family from the world, but it proved to be not only difficult, but completely impossible. It was a stressful thing to be in hiding, and it felt unnatural for all of us. So, while we have shared the occasional family photo over the last sixteen years, we have yet to openly discuss the details of our journey, and perhaps we never will. I kind of like the wall between our family and the rest of the world; it feels safe.

We don't see as much of the girls these days because they have become the social creatures that Phil and I are not. It is a bittersweet thing to watch your children grow. They don't just grow up; they start to grow away.

There is so much of which to be proud. Phil and I have managed to keep the girls safe, healthy, and happy. What I think is most notable, and Phil would agree, is how we have allowed our children to be exactly who they were meant to be. I should say that we have encouraged them to always be authentic people, and I think we have learned as much from them as they have learned from us. I keep talking as if this is the end of something, with all my reflections and wistful words, but the reality is that there is so much more to come. Just like me and Phil, our family has had notable eras; it just so happens that we are about to begin a new one.

Willow is tall like Phil and shares his beautiful bone structure. Her eyes are the same electric shades of blue, yellow, and green, and they are just as magnetic as Phil's. Her natural hair color is an almost-strawberry-blonde, though she recently asked Phil if she could dye it black. Of course she went to the one who has been dyeing his hair this way for years. She could have asked me, and I would have said yes. She will look even more like him now, and I don't know what it will be like to see her looking so differently yet so familiar.

Willow is a reader and a talker, and this reminds me of myself. Like me, she is a Gemini (born on the 25th of May), and she can talk to anyone about anything. Unlike us, she is an honest-to-God extrovert. She is happiest around large groups of people, and this was evident from the very beginning. Willow was the one who learned how to crawl just so she could gravitate toward the other children in the room. She would babble and point at everything, and Phil would help her find the words to flesh out the elaborate stories about the world around her.

Adrienne looks like me with her deep brown eyes, moon-shaped face, and thick, naturally-curly hair. She has Phil's penchant for the English language and my aptitude for writing. More than once, she has given us the impression that she will grow to be an author and illustrator. When she is not on her laptop, she is elbows deep inside of a sketchbook.

Adrienne is more reserved than Willow, and her true emotions remain a mystery to everyone but us. People say that she is hard to read and even harder to reach. She reminds me of Phil because some say that he can be emotionally distant, but I know him well enough to know that this isn’t true. Maybe this is why we don't have the same trouble with Adrienne that others do. She is, for all intents and purposes, an introvert. Only Willow can bring her out of her hiding places when Phil and I can't. Most of the time, we let her marinate, because we understand and respect the creative process.

Adrienne is an Aquarius, just like Phil, and she was born on the 11th of February, just twelve days after his 34th birthday. He had always said that she was the best gift I've ever given him. He cried when our daughters were born, and so did I. Somehow seeing Phil so crippled with emotion made him feel more real than ever before. He let me hold him the day that Willow was born, his body trembling with joy. "She's ours," he repeated into my wet cheek. "She's ours, Dan."

I may not have contributed to her creation the way that Phil did, but he made it clear that she was ours. She has always been ours. Adrienne is no less Phil's daughter for my part in her conception. She is just ours.

I remember holding Willow while Phil and her mother signed the baby's birth certificate. It was the only time that I felt a twinge of jealousy. It passed more quickly than it crept upon me, and for that I was extremely grateful. That night, as we admired our daughter under the low lights of the recovery room, Phil reminded me that everything that comes from his body belongs to me too. "It's our love for each other that brought her here Dan," he said, "this isn't about biology." He held me while I cried, and I held her to my chest. We decided that night that we would never refer to him as "Willow's dad," nor would we refer to me as our future child's father, exclusively, that is. We are equal parts father and partner to both girls, and that much is apparent in everything that we do. For example, I named Willow, and Phil named Adrienne. They are Willow Rowan Howell-Lester and Adrienne Katherine Howell-Lester. We all share the same last name.

I still remember the newborn smell, and so does Phil. We have talked about it before. There's nothing quite like the smell of a baby. They say that nostalgia enters through the nose and through the ears; I must agree. I can still smell the Weleda Baby Calendula Shampoo between my fingers. We still lived in London proper then, in a flat that proved to be far too small for our expanding family.

I remember how Adrienne's hair would curl just like mine after a bath. It would spring up into sweet little ringlets that reminded Phil of a thousand miniature Slinky toys. They were dark and rich in color, but they reflected honey and amber in the light. Phil would smile and run his long fingers through it before kissing my cheek and telling me how much she reminded him of me.

And then there is Willow with her long, straight hair, which has always been thin by comparison. It's always reminded me of the sunset with its surprise strands of gold and copper. She used to ask me to braid it after a bath so that she could wake up with waves like a mermaid. I can still feel the silky pieces moving through my fingers.

I don't remember the last time either of the girls asked Phil or me for help with their hair; they mostly rely on each other now, having long since realized that there are just things that we can't do well.

We're never saddled the girls with the heaviness of traditional gender roles or expectations. For example, they know that males can wear makeup and females can choose to forgo shaving their legs and underarms. They also know that love can happen in many ways. They know what love looks like between me and Phil. It is probably of what we are most proud: our endless commitment to each other.

It hasn't always been easy to be us. It was hard to be a young, new, couple at the eyes of so many strangers. Our relationship evolved under intense examination, and I wonder now if anyone else would have survived it. It had taken a toll on us at times, leaving us to consider walking away from the spectacle of the internet forever. We talked about it several times and seriously considered it twice. There was no alternative then, and there is no alternative now; ending our relationship was never, ever an option.

The internet is both a wonderful and terrifying place. It is the constant opposition of forces. The same people who tell you that they love you end up asking for more despite themselves. Sometimes I blame them, and sometimes I don't. In the end, it is our family that matters more than anything else.

We've found a way to make it work, and we agree that this is the best of both worlds. Our children are growing up, and Phil and I are just beginning to find ourselves hungry for something new, or maybe something old.

In a little over two years, Willow will be ready for university, if that is what she chooses to do. There is the possibility that she will stay with us a little longer, though it is beginning to look more and more like she wants to study abroad. I think about myself at her age, and I can't believe the differences between us. She has the confidence that I've never possessed and a need for people of all kinds. She isn't afraid; Willow has no limitations. She doesn't carry the weight of untreated depression like I did at her age, and for this, Phil and I are endlessly thankful.

Adrienne is not far behind her sister. She already knows that her passion requires higher education. I wonder how she will fare as an introvert at university, and I think of Phil. He made it work, and he did so well for himself. He will be able to guide her in a way that I can't. This makes me think of all the things that Phil has taught our girls over the years. He taught them how to read, and I taught them how to ride their bikes. He showed them how to shave their legs, and I showed them how to take care of their faces. Phil helped them hunt for Easter eggs, and I helped them reach the highest branches on the Christmas tree.

They don't need us for these things anymore. Willow can drive a car, and Adrienne can make a killer face mask from nothing more than the ingredients in our kitchen. Both girls are tall enough to reach the highest of our bookshelves, and they haven't hunted for Easter eggs in almost six years.

If I think about long enough, these memories have the power to take me straight to the mouth of a downward spiral. I tend to overthink absolutely everything, and depending on the day, I can be pessimistic, optimistic, or completely neutral. Today, I am feeling optimistic. Instead of allowing sadness to seep in as I reminisce on our times gone by, I will do as Phil as encouraged me to do and look at this crux as another opportunity for adventure.

There is nothing but the here and now. One day, this very moment will be one of our times gone by, and I will dream of it as I do of these things. How can I slow down time? How can I hit "pause" and preserve this moment forever?

I can't.

I can, as my therapist says, preserve moments by living in them. Phil tends to spend more time in the present moment than I do, and it is often he who brings me back to center when I have gone too far forward or stayed too far behind. "I need you here with me Baby," he says with a slow smile and a kiss on my lips.

So instead of counting the days that we have left as a family of four, as if there is some kind of expiration date, I am going to try and make every moment count.

"Time is like a cake Dan," Phil once explained, "you can shove it all in your mouth at once and spend a lot of time regretting your impulses, or you could refuse to take a bite and try to save it for later. But you know what? That cake isn't going to have much flavor if you do that. If I were you, I might take one bite at a time and savor each one."

"I like that Phil, but one bite at a time adds up. It will be gone before I know it. How am I supposed to enjoy the last bites if I know that there will be no more cake?"

He smiled and kissed my cheek. "How do you know that there will be no more cake my love? You don't. So, enjoy it, and trust that there will always be more."

He made so much sense. I still carry that with me, and today I am going to put it into practice. I hope that Phil is proud of me.  
Today, Willow is auditioning for a ballet company that may take her away from us even sooner than we expected. Before today, there was a small, selfish, part of me that hoped that she would not be accepted. Phil assured me, as he always does, that these feelings, as selfish as they may be, are completely normal and even admitted to having had them too. I love him so much.

I love him so much.

I don't know what will happen today or how things may change, but what I do know is that we will always be a family, no matter where we go or what we choose to do. Whether the girls are newborn babies, curious toddlers, rambunctious children, or extraordinary young people trying to find their way in this world, they have the love and support of two fathers behind them. And in the end, if there even is an end, it will be me and Phil, just like it was in the very beginning.

**Author's Note:**

> Hello Readers,  
> Please let me know if you have any interest in reading more about Dan and Phil with these original characters. I am considering a small collection based on this family wherein I share cute stories about their life together at various points. Thanks!  
> Much Love,  
> Spring_Haze


End file.
